Even though freedom of conscience is enshrined in Article 5 of the Tunisian constitution, which 'protects the free exercise of beliefs with reservation that they do not disturb the public order', a growing number of women experience coercion in religious practices. Rabiaa, in her 30s, is one of them. She admits to wearing Islamic garments out of fear of her husband's violence. 'He threatened to divorce me and to prevent me from seeing my kids if I insisted on my rejection of the veil and cloak,' she told Magharebia.

With the growing dominance of the Internet, blog, chat and mobile telephony, the great 'big bang' of the new media has begun. Communication is rapidly changing and becoming mobile, interactive, personalized and multi-channel. This extraordinary revolution is affecting the basic structure of Mediterranean societies, especially those in the south.

Women and girls living in Haiti’s makeshift camps face an increasing risk of rape and sexual violence, Amnesty International has said in a new report. One year after the earthquake which killed 230,000 people and injured 300,000, more than one million people still live in appalling conditions in tent cities in the capital Port-au-Prince and in the south of Haiti, where women are at serious risk of sexual attacks. Those responsible are predominately armed men who roam the camps after dark.

When darkness descends in the ubiquitous slums and ‘informal settlements’ surrounding Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, women who visit and use communal toilets unwittingly become sitting ducks. The dangers are high, for women living in the slums, that they may become targets of youth gangs and individual male rapists. 'I had heard that it was unsafe to visit the (community) toilet alone,' said forty-two year old, Rebecca Nduku, a single mother of three, when she challenged her friend’s ‘I-told-you-so’ warning. Acting against advice, Rebecca suffered irrevocably for throwing caution to the wind.

Twenty years after independence, representation of women in senior government structures and in Parliament is declining in Namibia. According to the latest demographic survey results of August 2010, out of a population of around two million, women outnumber men 10:9. In 2001, the ratio was 94 males per 100 females. In 2010 Namibia reformed its national gender policy in line with the United Nation’s millennium development goals (MDGs) and its own Vision 2030, a national development policy dissected into five-yearly development plans. It includes the increase of women in decision-making positions in government, the private sector, religious groups and community institutions.

Amnesty International has welcomed a Zimbabwe court's decision to acquit a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) rights activist charged with possession of pornographic materials.Ellen Chademana, an administrative assistant at the prominent NGO Gays and Lesbians of Zimbabwe (GALZ), was acquitted by a magistrate's court in Harare. The charges followed an armed police raid on the GALZ offices in Milton Park Harare in May.

Algeria's National Consultative Committee on the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights (CNCPPDH) held a conference in Algiers on 9 December on ways to implement civil rights legislation and enhance the role of women in politics. One hundred and fifty delegates, including ministers, UN agency representatives in Algiers, the two houses of parliament, members of diplomatic bodies in Algiers, along with representatives from the judicial police and national police force, took part in the conference, held to mark the 62nd anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

This report from the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) says the analysis of the current context in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) makes obvious the existing persistence gender imbalance in all the domains of economical, social, cultural and political development. Access of women to decision making tables, as well as to national economical resources and production factors remains very limited. The situation has deteriorated in latter years with the negative effects of wars in repetition, to the current persistent insecurity. In fact, 61.2 per cent of Congolese women live underneath the poverty threshold. Furthermore, in the DRC, the situation of gender-based violence; particularly domestic violence on women and young girls is very worrying. Collected national data on various forms of Violence Against Women (VAW) demonstrates how it strongly correlates with under-development (human, economic, social and infrastructure).

AIDS-Free World has condemned statements by a prominent Ghanaian activist, citing the statements as further evidence of the alarming homophobia that is sweeping across Africa. The statement argued publicly for the Constitution Review Commission to limit Ghana's definition of marriage to include heterosexual couples only. Read the full statement by clicking on the link provided.

Research has shown that women account for more than half of the population of any country. This is reflected in the 2010 Census results, where there are slightly more women than men in Kenya. However, this large population of women is invisible in key decision-making processes, particularly in governance - at both local and national level. Even though the trend is slowly changing in Kenya and there are now more women in the current Parliament than there have ever been, there is still a need for more women in political leadership.

The arrest of more than 60 Sudanese women's rights activists on 14 December 2010, for peacefully protesting the lashing of a woman by police shows the urgent need to reform Sudan's public order laws and practices, Human Rights Watch has said. The system imposes illegitimate restrictions on a range of personal behavior and public expression and disproportionately targets women, Human Rights Watch said. The lashing case, in a public place in Omdurman in November, garnered public attention as it was captured on a video clip, widely circulated on the internet and in the media. Visit this link to read more and to watch the video.

While male voices continue to dominate public discourse across the continent, Rasna Warah finds that a new documentary and anthology of stories have allowed women ‘to speak as honestly and as truthfully about their experiences as they can’.

On the morning of Tuesday 14 December, hundreds of women and men came on the streets in central Khartoum planning to walk peacefully to the Ministry of Justice to hand in a memo signed by a large number of Sudanese men and women protesting against the repressive and humiliating practices and laws constituted by the Sudanese Public Order Regime and to condemn the flogging of women. Prior to reaching the ministry, and while people were still gathering, a wave of arrests took place, with approximately 41 women and five men summarily arrested.

Gender Links (GL) has called on the government to declare a state of emergency in the fight to end gender violence. In a press release to mark the close of the Sixteen Days of Activism Against Gender Violence, GL said that countless research studies now show that the problem is overwhelming and the response is insufficient, especially when measured against the target of halving gender violence by 2015 in the SADC Protocol on Gender and Development.

'He pulled me by my hair and dragged me to the entrance of the house. I knew he was taking me to the bedroom, and I knew what that would mean. His one hand pulled at my long hair, braided to my scalp while his other hand wrapped itself around my face, choking me, his fingers digging into my eyes...I held on to the gate and refused to let him take me in - that was when he bit off half my ear.' Three weeks earlier, 46-year-old Gugu Mofokeng had left the shelter where she had been living for a year. Mofokeng's story may sound shocking, but it is not unusual in South Africa. Gender activists have long argued that violence against women in the country is at 'epidemic' proportions.

While Tanzania outlawed female genital mutilation (FGM) in 1998, mass FGM ceremonies are still going on, in particular in the November-January season. Activists expect over 5,000 girls to be cut 'this holiday season'. The government of Tanzania passed a law prohibiting FGM in 1998 and yet reports indicate that during the current holiday season, about 250 girls have already been cut and over 5,000 girls are at risk of being genitally mutilated in Tarime district of Tanzania’s Mara Region alone.

Security of two suspected gay persons arrested and released from Makerere and Wandegeya police posts in Uganda is a major concern since Mitchell Hall Gradens’ residents, where they were arrested, believe lynching would be the perfect solution to stop their alleged homosexuality. Eye witnesses claim that the two were found engaging in ‘homosexual activities’ at around 10pm on Wednesday 8 December. 'The person who found them, known only as Tamale, called other hall residents and they arrested the two. The mob wanted to lynch them but the Hall security intervened and the two were taken to police,' Adrian Jjuuko of Human Rights Awareness and Promotion Forum Uganda (HRAPF) stated.

Moroccan women are acutely underrepresented in the media sector, according to a recent report. National Moroccan Press Syndicate (SNPM) data show that women constitute just 26 per cent of journalists in the country. The SNPM revealed in its 23 November study that 1,755 men hold a professional journalist card from the Ministry of Communication, as opposed to 632 women.

The Western African country of Sierra Leone is gradually emerging from a protracted civil war, which poses unique problems for mothers-to-be. In 2009, Amnesty International named the maternal mortality rate in Sierra Leone a 'human rights emergency', which at 1/8 is one of the highest in the world. But recent changes in policy and support from NGOs like Life for African Mothers have increased the potential for markedly improving maternal and child health.

'GALZ deplores actions by the Zimbabwe Republic Police against Sexual Rights Centre, members of the LGBTI community and activists at a recent event organised by Musasa Project to mark 16 days of activism in Bulawayo. The uninformed and arbitrary decision to ask these members to leave the event
only serves to reinforce the bigotry and discrimination of sexual minorities at a platform where organisations such as these are working tirelessly to eradicate sexism and its effects.'